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16

General / Re: modified version of Labor Theory of Value...

« on: February 21, 2006, 11:34:05 PM »

What is "perfect competition?"

an infinite high quality supply of goods to choose from inwhich all the information about the good is known for an infinite number of buyers...

In that scenario government would work too because an infinite number of people could monitor the infinite number of actions made by officials and politicians and make sure nobody does anything bad.

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General / Re: modified version of Labor Theory of Value...

« on: February 21, 2006, 11:03:42 PM »

Perfect competition is when it doesn't rain during a marathon.

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General / Re: why aren't you an anarchist?

« on: February 21, 2006, 06:06:56 PM »

BenTucker is a parrot. That made my day.

19

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 05:49:35 PM »

So if these officials and lawmakers have little power and can't go outside of the contract or change the contract for that matter what will be their purpose? What kind of campaings will they run to get elected? Obviously they can't promise any changes since everything is already agreed to in the contract. How will two candidates differentiate themselves?

How and why will they be more accountable than the officials and lawmakers we have now?

Basically what I'm asking is, what is this magical aspect to your government that will make it work while thousands of governments in our past and present have failed to serve the people and instead enslaved them?

Btw, have you read about Anarcho-Capitalist societies?

http://www.mises.org/story/1121 Medieval Iceland and the Absence of Government
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig3/long1.html Privatization, Viking Style: Model or Misfortune?
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Iceland/Iceland.html Private Creation and Enforcement of Law: A Historical Case
http://www.mises.org/rothbard/newliberty11.asp The Public Sector, III: Police, Law, and the Courts

20

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 04:41:51 PM »

Will the winning candidate have to get 100% of the votes?

This is up for debate of course, but I see no reason to depart from majority vote at this point.

Plus I believe you are operating from a false assumption (correct me if I'm wrong):
The elected officials (candidate would therefore be candidates) would have little "power" and certainly not more than what you would be voluntarily granting to a private DRO or security firm. They cannot vote anything away... only operate the business so to speak.

You are basically describing what we have today... Why do you think your society will be better?

21

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 03:02:51 PM »

I'm an Anarchist, not a Libertarian.

You don't support the NAP?

I won't agress against someone without reason, so if that's what you mean then I support the NAP.

I don't call myself Libertarian because the word has been bastardized and is now used by statists.

22

General / Re: modified version of Labor Theory of Value...

« on: February 21, 2006, 02:57:47 PM »

You can add even more value if you carry one flower at a time. Next thing you know, your house will be worth MILLION$!!

23

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 02:53:56 PM »

There wouldn't be much difference between the private organization and the government apart from election rules, strong checks and balances and the funding methods.

Will the winning candidate have to get 100% of the votes?

24

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 02:26:39 PM »

How are you going to pay to protect peoples rights if you aren't going to collect taxes?

There's plenty of ways.

First, I'm pretty sure we would both agree that there will be less crime in a Libertarian community because of various factors (we can go deeper into that if you want, or don't agree). There would therefore be a lower demand concerning arbitration (which could also be handled by third parties) and a much lower demand for police and court services.

We could therefore fund the protection forces by combining voluntary funding and coercive funding (retaliatory use of force, to which only pacifists will disagree) in this fashion.

Voluntary funding
1) private donations from business and individuals (same thing I know.. but the stakes might be higher for business owners)
2) passive advertizing on government websites, cars, buildings and property in general
3) other methods smarter people will figure out

Coercive funding
1) fees for services (due by the party(ies) who originated the need for such services)
2) reparations for dammages to government property (by the violator)

Why would people donate to a monopolized protection service instead of hiring a private one? What incentive would you have? If you feel like the private firm can do a better job of protecting you, why would you donate to a government protection agency and hope that they protect you?

25

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 01:28:22 PM »

How are you going to pay to protect peoples rights if you aren't going to collect taxes?

26

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 12:24:05 PM »

I would band with like-minded individuals and spring up a Libertarian (I am not an anarchist, but anarchists could do the same if they wanted to) community where no other community existed before.

How will your Libertarian government be better than the current government?

How do you determine that, for example, paying a $5 tax is bad but a $4.99 tax is freedom? Which services will your libertarian government offer and how do you determine that these services are in fact Libertarian in nature?

Also, on the flip side, you said that you do not want to impose your Libertarian government on anyone, thus it seems to me that every individual in your Libertarian society will have to agree to your rules voluntarily. I would say this is Anarchy because if ever person agrees then they have no feeling of confinement, thus no feeling of someone ruling over them, thus no rulers (even though technically I guess you will have a president or whatever). So if you can do whatever you want (following your rules was their voluntary desire) then isn't that Anarchy?

27

The Polling Pit / Re: The 6 types of Libertarians, which are you?

« on: February 21, 2006, 12:09:27 PM »

Within either framework, mini governments, which would be perceived as private entities, could come into power: The Libertarian side of things would embrace such systems, hopefully up to and before they committed to acts of force (depending on crime/reparations law nuances) or attempted to overthrow the current system forcefully, while the anarchist philosophy would be inclined to (??) reject to such conglomeration as it would institute a 'state' of chaos. I just find Libertarianism to be more likely to succeed.

I don't see Anarchism as being against organization. In my mind Anarchism is simply against legitimizing of force. If you wanted to form a gated community, commune, mini government inside an anarcho-capitalist society there would be absolutely no problem there as long as each of the members enter into your contract voluntarily and they can leave even if it breaks the contract (because an individual cannot contract themselves into slavery). Basically the only thing the contract could do is dictate how they behave in your little society and if they don't abide by the contract you can kick them out, but you cannot force them to stay using the contract (at least in theory).

I think in practice though, there would be much looser contracts. For example a bunch of neighbors in a wide area may contract together to defend the area in case of invaders or whatever. There are many different angles to this and each community can adapt the system to their culture and preferred way of doing things.

Like minded individuals would like congregate in areas where things are done their way.

The problem I see today is that we have a lot of the same. So when you complain and someone says "Why don't you go somewhere else?" there really isn't anywhere else to go. If all of North America was Anarchist there would suddenly be a lot of very diverse societies because there is no longer a conformist central government molding people through the public school system.

Ability being infinitely diverse: You may not have the ability to exercise all of your rights, but you may have the ability to infringe on the rights of others. Enforcing rights is a problem. Although I may be giving some lip service to the Anarcho-Capitalists, I find that there's always some level of recognition of the 'state' of the environment, whether a government is present or not, through the recognition of contract.

Again, you seem to be thinking of Anarchy as the mean stream definition which leads to chaos and what not. When in fact there is probably more order in an Anarchist society than in our current society, for one simple reason: In Anarchy you are required to be more responsible and cautious in life, while in statism you can rely on government to get you out of trouble if you screw up by forcing banks to forgive your debts and giving you money if you loose your job, etc.

The root matter is individual sovereignty. I like the idea of a system that recognizes the individual in terms of defense against slavery, and ultimately coercion (even though such a system is not perfect and I don't totally agree with it philosophically, it appears to be a best-fit). For all other 'rights', it's simply a matter of 'fighting' for your rights, or engaging in the 'right', or should I say ability (?) to contract, which I think the Anarcho-Capitalists would be more inclined to side with. Private groups would be free to compete so the government not be the first group to address all problems.

Government protects you from slavery by enslaving you itself. You should have realized this by now. You work so that you can pay your taxes, if you stop working men with guns will come and take your property because you couldn't pay the property taxes. That is slavery.

I recommend that you read this:

http://www.mises.org/story/1970 The Nature of Man and His Government
http://www.mises.org/story/1987 Society Needs No Managers

Examples of Anarcho-Capitalist societies

http://www.mises.org/story/1121 Medieval Iceland and the Absence of Government
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig3/long1.html Privatization, Viking Style: Model or Misfortune?
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Iceland/Iceland.html Private Creation and Enforcement of Law: A Historical Case
http://www.mises.org/rothbard/newliberty11.asp The Public Sector, III: Police, Law, and the Courts

28

General / Re: Your vision for Liberty in your lifetime

« on: February 21, 2006, 10:45:12 AM »

That is if you wish to take control of the political process and state aparatus in order to impose a Libertarian government to your city, state, or to the entire country with a really overwhelming popular support (which will take sometime to build). In that case, I would say you are probably right (although I'm pretty sure we would see sporadic violence here and there), but if you only get a majority to agree, then it's gonna be bloody.
Either way, Liberating anything more than a small group of like minded individuals in a previously uninhabited area, is going to prove outrageously long and possibly bloody (assuming it could work at all).

Imposing a Libertarian government on others isn't any different from the current government imposing itself on us. Besides I'm an Anarchist, not a Libertarian.

29

General / Re: What was the 'Forefathers' political beliefs

« on: February 20, 2006, 11:56:16 PM »

classical liberal = libertarian

liberal means liberty, it's just that the present day liberals hijacked the word and changed the meaning to be liberty in social interaction ONLY instead of liberty in social and economic interaction.

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General / Re: What was the 'Forefathers' political beliefs

« on: February 20, 2006, 11:55:28 PM »

Just a question for arguments sake.......if the people who wrote the constitution or the declaration of independance or whatever- if they intended a liberal society over a libertarian.....who are we to use their documents against them?

Huh?

liberal then is libertarian now, did you not read what TN_FSP wrote?!